EVENTS

Although I have been accused of trying to be the incarnation of W. S. Gilbert (high praise I don’t come close to deserving!), I have a confession: In the constellation of all things G&S, although I admired Gilbert tremendously, he was never my source of inspiration. When I think of Gilbert and Sullivan, my thoughts are not of abstract words or perfect melodies, but of one voice–the voice of John Reed.

Our library had, and I often borrowed, a large collection of the D’oyly Carte recordings; most featured Reed as the comic baritone. It was his voice that defined G&S for me, and brought Gilbert’s words, Sullivan’s melodies, to perfect life. Reed’s voice was not operatically trained, but it was perfect for this task (others may disagree and have their own favorites, but I am right). I am very happy he sang at a time when a good stereo recording was possible.

Imitation being flattery and all that, I reprise an earlier bit of work. Far better to acknowledge this as inspired by Reed than by the undeserving creationist plagiarists.

I am the very model of a devious creationistI’ve made a film that’s best described as stolen-animationistI know the use of rhetoric when facts are unavailableTo render the impossible into the unassailable

I’m very well acquainted, too, with data manufacturingI’ll claim I stand on solid granite even as it’s fracturingI document complexity, like when it’s irreducible…And think my movie’s in the league of Arthur Miller’s Crucible

And think my movie’s in the league of Arthur Miller’s CrucibleAnd think my movie’s in the league of Arthur Miller’s CrucibleAnd think my movie’s in the league of Arthur Miller’s Crucible

I’m very good at lying, both the verbal and statistical—Like Darwin in his later years, I’m openly theisticalIn short, you might describe me as a mental masturbationistI am the very model of a devious creationist

In short, you might describe him as a mental masturbationistHe is the very model of a devious creationist

My evidence, in volumes that would baffle a librarianIs not so much orthogonal as utterly contrarianPresented with a problem like the claw of a DeinonychusI pause for just a moment, then it’s “Dammit, bring it on!” I cuss

My scientific colleagues have been banned from UniversitiesExpecting them to publish was just one of their adversitiesThey’ve parried the attacks of retroviruses endogenousMaintaining all the while that Darwinians are dodgin’ us

Maintaining all the while that Darwinians are dodgin’ usMaintaining all the while that Darwinians are dodgin’ usMaintaining all the while that Darwinians are dodgin’ us

My evidence is solid as a fossil of triceratopsPresented with the humor of a monologue of Carrot Top’sIn short, you might describe me as a mental masturbationistI am the very model of a devious creationist

In short, you might describe him as a mental masturbationistHe is the very model of a devious creationist

In fact, when I know what is meant by “cinemas” and “enemas”When I can tell by sight the harmless serpent from the venomousAnd claim I found the evidence in chapter one of GenesisYou’ll see, compared to Darwinists, which one of us the menace is

When I have crack’d a book on Evo-Devo or BiologyEnough to understand instead of mutter simply “Golly gee!”And understand my argument is simply false dichotomyYou’ll say that this creationist does not deserve lobotomy

You’ll say that this creationist does not deserve lobotomyYou’ll say that this creationist does not deserve lobotomyYou’ll say that this creationist does not deserve lobotomy

For the science that I know was not updated for millenniaNot since the latest virgin birth, or genesis partheniaBut still, you might describe me as a mental masturbationistI am the very model of a devious creationist

But still, you might describe him as a mental masturbationistHe is the very model of a devious creationist

When the power goes out And I’m starting to doubtThat the house will be here in the morningWhen the wind and the rainBring us heartache and painLike some biblical end-of-days warningWhen the snapping of treesBrings the town to its kneesAnd our courage is starting to ebbDoes it make me a dopeIf my one fervent hopeWas to get myself back on the web?

****

Ok, that was a joke, not the truth. We did lose power here, for about 10 hours, which is next to nothing for a good storm. Within a stone’s throw from here (literally), they still do not have power, some 20 hours in total, and will not for a while. A short walk away finds trees toppled over power lines, with no crews working on them–which means these are small potatoes in comparison with the *real* problems. A house I pass by every day has two mature pines, just under 2 feet in diameter each, now securely embedded in the roof. One tree was uprooted (rain made the ground a bit soft), and the other snapped like a toothpick about 20 feet up the trunk. The first hit the garage; the second hit the middle of the roofline.

We can’t leave our town, since all roads have downed power lines. Or did, anyway; we had no reason to keep checking. We have food, water, and now power, and so will be offering our showers and stove to our neighbors. (Yes, I put showers first. Trust me on this.)

The forecast says I had better finish this up, because we should get hit again tonight. Within the hour it should start.

Don’t worry about me. I’ve got plenty of food & water, and a wood stove if necessary (it wasn’t for the mere overnight power loss). I like losing power, actually… which shows how incredibly well off I am, compared to so many. (Or how stupid, but let’s not go there.)

Stay warm and safe, my friends. Thank science and technology that it is much easier for us to do so than pretty much any of our ancestors.

Lindsey Vonn was badly bruised; Her shin was black and blue.But these are the Olympic Games–Whatever would she do?Some athletes rub on emu fat;For some, placenta pleases–But Lindsey Vonn’s a different sort:She put her faith in cheeses.

She could not race until she healed;Her hopes would all be lost,And so went where cheese is pricedTo calculate the cost.She found some at the marketplaceAnd bought a couple tins,To make a Topfen poulticeFor forgiveness for her shins.

By all accounts, her injuryWas really rather vicious–But thanks to cheeses, once againHer legs are just delicious.Apparently, for Austrians,This cure is very old–My guess is we’ll see more like this,Since Lindsey got her Gold!

****

My guess is, if you follow the Olympic Games at all, you already know about Lindsey Vonn’s injury. It was her great good fortune that the weather caused a series of delays, giving her shin time to heal, at least a bit. During that time, she used some laser therapy, massage, painkillers, and now we hear, a poultice made of cheese.

After injuring her shin in Austria during training, American downhill skier Lindsey Vonn did what Austrian skiers do: She wrapped topfen cheese curd around her swollen right leg in hopes of reducing the swelling.

Whether or not the cheese helped her recover enough to win an Olympic gold medal Wednesday, the Austrian curd remains obscure.

Many gourmet cheesemongers aren’t familiar with the semisoft cream cheese-like fromage, and sports medicine experts certainly aren’t rushing out to prescribe it to injured patients.

Top athletes are often superstitious (having had a lot of success, they have had a lot of opportunity to falsely correlate that success with a lucky object, routine, or ritual); it is no surprise that, having had plenty of opportunity to recover from injury, athletes are prone to some pretty strange cures as well:

When orthopedic surgeon Dr. John Benjamin heard that Vonn had spread cheese on her hurt shin, he said he chuckled. “It’s a curious use for a dairy product, and I have not heard reports of great success,” he says.

Other curious treatments for sports injuries have ranged from rubbing placenta juice into a bad hamstring as Serbian soccer player Danko Lazovic reportedly did, according to the AP, and using the fat of an emu as a rub for pain and swelling.

You may also remember, if you followed this in the news, that Ms. Vonn initially suspected that her leg might be broken, but refused X-rays to confirm her suspicion. She was “putting her fingers in her ears” and refusing to consider the possibility that she would spend the Olympic Games with her leg in a cast, because of a broken shin.

Maybe it was denial and fear, but my hope is that her refusal to X-ray, her refusal to have her leg in plaster, came from her innate determination, her perseverance, her guts, her metaphorical cojones. I picture her telling her doctor “let he who is without stones cast the first shin. I’m putting my faith in cheeses.”

If I thought I had the answerTo a killer such as cancerI would fight against The Lord, HimselfTo make my findings known;To make certain I was certainI would gladly raise the curtainSo that anyone could take a shotAt what, therein, was shown.

I would never ask immunityTo jabs from the communityIf doing so would cover upThe rigor that I lack;But Moritz and Maloney,Though they’re through and through baloney,Choose to run away from evidence:They duck just like a quack.

Both PZ and Orac have already taken them to task, but I forgot to actually post this little verse on my own site.

My right hand twitches, my left hand itches,My knees won’t stay in the legs of my britches,The man on TV says it’s probably witches,My dad says it’s all in my genes.My vision is hazy, and one eye is lazy,The ache in my hip makes me thnk it’s dysplasia,People are looking at me like I’m crazy,I’m blaming it all on vaccines.

My nerves are fraying, my hair is graying, When the moon is full, I can’t help baying,My voice gives out in the middle of praying,I’m growing allergic to beans.My ears feel funny, my nose is runny,My skin turns green when the weather’s sunny,My piss runs clear, but it tastes like honey,I’m blaming it all on vaccines.

My feet are stinky, my phlegm is inky, There’s parasite worms in the joints of my pinky,My corpus callosum is shriveled and dinky,I’m really not sure what it means.My liver’s aching, my spleen is shaking,The bones of my spine are all cracking and breaking,But rather than coyly admit that I’m faking,I’m blaming it all on vaccines.

****

Inspired by PZ’s post on the cheerleader who developed all those bizarre symptoms shortly after her vaccination. Although her disorder made no sense physically, the antivaxxers invited her gladly… because they are never ones to let actual science get in the way of a good story.

I’d link to PZ, but my laptop died two weeks ago, and I am posting this from a coal-fired difference engine we long ago decided was obsolete. It is. I can’t open pharyngula now, without the computer crashing. I am sure you can find it yourself.

Meanwhile, happy valentine’s day, and thank you very much to the person who used one of my valentine poems and actually tipped!

On the newsstand at the stationThere it was, a publicationWith a bold prevaricationWhere it asked “Was Darwin Wrong?”Darwin stands among the giantsOf our modern view of scienceSo, in answer and defianceI’m replying in this song:

Happy Birthday, Charles Darwin, take a look around today—You might recognize the path we took, cos you showed us the way.We will celebrate your influence with unabashed delight;Happy Birthday Charles Darwin, you were right!

Variation in the featuresOf all sorts of nature’s creaturesWas a sign of God, for preachers,But you thought you’d take a lookIt’s descent and not creation That explains the populationSo we start the celebrationFor the guy who wrote the book

Happy Birthday, Charles Darwin, take a look around today—You might recognize the path we took, cos you showed us the way.We will celebrate your influence with unabashed delight;Happy Birthday Charles Darwin, you were right!

From the South Pacific IslandsTo the bonny Scottish Highlands,In the oceans and the dry landsWe can see the evidence.From diversity most splendid,We infer that we descended;It was you who comprehendedAnd your impact was immense!

Happy Birthday, Charles Darwin, take a look around today—You might recognize the path we took, cos you showed us the way.We will celebrate your influence with unabashed delight;Happy Birthday Charles Darwin, you were right!

Well, the theory you createdHas, for decades, been updated,But it shouldn’t be unstatedThat it all began with youThat’s the way with any theoryThough detractors may grow wearyAs they try to make folks leeryBut they can’t deny it’s true

Happy Birthday, Charles Darwin, take a look around today—You might recognize the path we took, cos you showed us the way.We will celebrate your influence with unabashed delight;Happy Birthday Charles Darwin, you were right!

The learned Judge showed mercy,For she knew the man devout;One cannot be religious, andA brutal, lowly lout–Religion shows the brighter light,Not worldly, but sublime;You’d never break a fellow’s jaw…Except, of course, this time.

The learned judge, she reasonedThat forgiveness was the path;She’d demonstrate God’s mercyWhen she could have picked God’s wrath.A judge who follows faithfullyCould never be a dunce;She’d choose the wise and sober course…Except, of course, this once.

The learned judge is hearingFrom the slighted and the wrongedFor speaking through her prejudiceAs if such views belonged.Some arguments belong in court,But then again, some don’t;The judge should learn from this mistake…Except, of course, she won’t.

How dare she talk to boys as friends!It’s time to dig a holeThis is where her flirting ends!It’s time to dig a holeAt sixteen years, a headstrong girlGet in the hole and kneelShe used to be my precious pearlGet in the hole and kneelShe would not bend to my demandsA shovel-full of dirtSo hold her tight and bind her handsA shovel-full of dirtThe family council called for deathIgnore her cries and screamsInhaling earth with every breathIgnore her cries and screamsOur family’s honor is at stakeSo bury her aliveWe have a code we cannot breakSo bury her aliveThrow more dirt down on her headA daughter must obeyIt took a while, but now she’s deadA daughter must obeyMy daughter’s gone, the shameless whoreA father’s word is lawBut no great loss–I’ve got eight moreA father’s word is law

This is the hole where she died. Where her own family buried her alive. Where she breathed and swallowed dirt, kneeling with hands bound, until her death restored her family’s honor.

M.M., a 16 year old Turkish girl, had male friends she would talk to. It appears, according to reports, that this was the reason her own father and grandfather buried her alive.

This is one of those stories I cannot read without putting my daughter’s face on the victim’s. Sixteen was not that long ago.

It’s not hatred; it’s not loathing;It’s the emperor’s new clothing,And Creationism doesn’t have a stitch.There’s no bible-methodologyThat’s better than biology–It seems a level playing-field’s a bitch.

When the real world’s more excitingThan some Aramaic writing,Cos it adds to what we know about ourself,Then the bible’s contributionWhen it comes to evolutionIs most useful when you keep it on the shelf.

See, the truth about the agesIsn’t there within its pagesIt’s a waste of time to even go and lookScience strives to see the lawfulBut the bible’s frankly awful:All in all, the perfect anti-science book!

A repost from a year ago, and pretty much nothing at all has changed. My wish is that one of these years, a QB is going to say “well, first of all, I gotta give it all up for my lord and savior Jesus Christ, without whom nothing is possible. I couldn’t have done what I did without Him watching over me”… in the presence of an offensive line that sweated blood to keep this guy off the turf for 4 quarters, and who are comprised of a very talented group of Muslim, Jew, Buddhist, and atheist athletes who decide to let Jesus take care of the QB by himself next game.

Oh, well. Not likely in this lifetime.

The repost:

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It’s Super Bowl Sunday again (well, tomorrow, as I write)! I must admit, I love the Super Bowl. Not because it is the SB, but because it is the last meaningful game before next season. My dad, when I was really young, was a football coach, so I watch football looking for all the fun interior line details that are never part of the televised commentary; football, like so many things, gets better the more you know about it.

What is irritating, though, is that God is always on the side of the winners (as PZ noted); it is such a great time to wear one’s religion on one’s sleeve. Of course, it also bothers me that even those among us who find that notion silly, the same after-the-fact reasoning is used to show that the team that had greater will to win, that wanted it more, that just refused to say die, is the one who took the trophy home. Nobody ever gives up the will to win, but then cruises to victory anyway.

Anyway, here’s the song of the day… with sincere apologies to Bob Dylan, and to pretty much everybody else, too.

Oh, the workouts are nothin’And the wind sprints are lessWe don’t even practiceWe think that it’s bestCos practice means nothingI’m forced to confide—But we’ll win big on SundayWith God on our side

Oh the networks will show itThey’ll show it so wellHow the righteous team wonAnd the evil team fellOh the righteous team wonBut it’s not cos we triedIt’s Super Bowl SundayWith God on our side

Oh, when I cross the goal lineI’ll raise my arm highWith one upraised fingerI’ll point to the skyI’m sending a messageThat can’t be deniedI just scored a touchdownWith God on my side

When it’s fourth down and inchesWe’ll go for it allIt’s a quarterback keeperBut where is the ballThey’ll bring out the chain gangAnd the refs will decideFirst and ten to the team With God on their side

And the fans in the stadiumWill cheer on their teamsAnd eat without stoppingOr that’s how it seemsAnd most of it’s saltyAnd all of it’s friedThey’ll eat it on SundayWith God on their side

Oh, it won’t even matterWhat’s the final scoreThe points aren’t importantThat’s not what it’s forThis game’s about JesusWe can all say with prideWe won big on SundayWith God on our side

We gather each SundayWe won’t miss a weekIt’s more than just victoryIt’s salvation we seekIt’s more than religionIt’s the reason Christ diedSo we could play footballWith God on our side